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to each other. Mason has drunk enough Champaign to feel very relax and talkative.
Mason: (The scene cuts in as Mason is talking). Dad lives pretty much as he’s wanted to;
the family just has to fit in around him. He rules firmly with velvet-covered brass knuckles.
Veronica: Oh, that’s not true. You have a lot of responsibilities at Capwell Enterprises.
Mason: Oh, that’s true but he rides herd over every one of them. No matter what I do I’m
never able to really please him. I never seem to be able to do things exactly the way he
would have done them. Which of course is the way God himself would have done things.
Peter: Fascinating. Do I sense some hostility?
Veronica: Well, he is a very powerful man.
Mason: But power is ugly when it’s wheedled to hide a personality problem. Hitler was
powerful, so was Ivan the Terrible. Hardly admirable men.
Veronica: Mason! Your not comparing C.C. Capwell to those men?
Mason: You didn’t have to suffer the agony of being his son. You know when I graduated
Harvard he missed my graduation because of some South America deal. But if Channing
were competing in some National Equestrian event, he would drop everything to be there.
Veronica: Really?
Mason: Yeah, oh he’s always wanted to be in the history books. I’ve often thought,
privately, that it would be amusing if one day his story ends up argued over who was worse,
C.C. Capwell or Attila the Hun.
Peter: (Is chuckling in the secret room, watching, listening, and recorder Mason without
his knowledge). I doubt if C.C. has any idea how much his son hates him. Nor would Mason
want him to know. Nice work, Veronica.
Mason: How did I get off on this discussion?
Veronica: I have no idea.
Mason: Well you got to promise me, not one word of this will ever leave this room.
Peter: (Chuckles in the next room).